This invention relates to a fence providing an upright surface for practising tennis and similar games.
In the absence of a playing partner, it is an essential and common part of a tennis player's development to practise by hitting a ball against an upright rigid structure from which the ball will rebound to be hit again.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,373,720 discloses a tennis practice backboard having a curved surface designed to allow a ball hit against the backboard to return to approximately the same spot at about the same height every time. The system is constructed from a plurality of panels. Such a structure is however inevitably quite expensive.
The most common forms of upright tennis practice structure are constructed from either rendered brickwork or rendered or unrendered concrete block work. These however are time consuming and disruptive to construct and create a solid non see-through upright structure which can be out of character in many surroundings and which provide a place to hide behind in public parks and open spaces. Other forms of upright tennis practice structure are made from wooden boards which are prone to rotting, generate excessive noise when struck by a tennis ball and also form a solid non see-through structure.
Conventional fencing systems, such as those with which tennis courts are commonly surrounded, are unsuitable for tennis practice because of their semi-rigid nature, mesh size, mesh joining methods and protrusions and fixings on the rebound surface which cause irregular and unpredictable ball rebound behaviour.
FR-A-2775494 discloses a crowd barrier fence wherein upright posts are connected by horizontal bars which support wire mesh panels, with a smaller mesh at the bottom than at the top. Since the posts are exposed between the mesh panels, the fence has overall a relatively uneven surface.